by
C. Ronald FranksBay grasses (also known as submerged
aquatic vegetation or "SAV") are a critical resource that provide food and
habitat for a wide range of Bay species, including crabs, fish and waterfowl.
Bay grasses also protect shorelines from erosion, remove nutrients from the
water, produce oxygen and trap sediments that cloud Bay waters.

Restoring bay
grasses to historic levels is recognized to be one of the cornerstones of
restoring the Chesapeake Bay.

Unfortunately, underwater bay grass acreage in
Maryland's portion of the Chesapeake suffered a setback in 2003, a result of
reduced water clarity caused by record levels of rainfall, and the larger than
normal runoff of sediments and nutrients that ensues.

While acreage Baywide
dropped 30 percent from 2002 to 2003, acreage in the Maryland portion of the Bay
dropped from 52,546 acres to 30,990 acres - 41 percent.

Despite the overall
reduction in bay grass coverage, several areas recorded their highest levels
since the Baywide SAV survey began in 1984, including the Bohemia, middle
Patuxent and upper Patuxent Rivers. Additionally, the middle Potomac River
continued a two-year recovery. Analyses are under way to understand why grasses
in these rivers increased while declining throughout most of the rest of the
Bay.

The Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has long recognized the
need for a large-scale restoration approach. There are areas of the Bay where
water quality has improved sufficiently to support bay grasses, yet natural revegetation could not take place for lack of seeds. Previously existing methods
of collecting grass seeds by hand simply could not provide the number of seeds
needed to support our restoration goal - 1,000 acres by 2008.

Today DNR is
greatly accelerating the pace of bay grass restoration, using a combination of
new technologies and conventional equipment. These restoration activities are
being focused on unvegetated areas with suitable habitat, and there is the
possibility that planting or seeding large beds could also lead to vigorous
natural revegetation in adjoining areas.

In one recent effort, DNR's Resource
Assessment Service used a mechanical harvesting boat as an innovative approach
to more efficiently collect large amounts of eelgrass seeds. These photos
document that effort.

Using this
new technique, DNR biologists estimate they will harvest 20 million eelgrass
seeds this year (compared with 500,000 last year) which could restore 100 acres
of eelgrass.

This new method uses
a boat to "mow" the grass beds, taking seeds and reproductive shoots but leaving
the roots and rest of the plants in place. Only a small portion of the
seeds and reproductive shoots are removed from each healthy bed; these will be
planted later in unvegetated areas.

After the beds are "mown", the eelgrass shoots and
seeds are taken to DNR's Piney Point Aquaculture Facility on the Potomac River
and processed to separate seeds from shoots. This fall they will then be
planed in the Potomac and Patuxent Rivers.